Tofurky day!

Joe and I had a low key Thanksgiving with minimal mental melt downs. I decided I did not want to have a brain aneurysm so I decided not to make pie crust. Joe decided he did want to have a brain aneurysm and made Peking duck.

This is not duck. This is cornbread.

Joe warned me that the duck carcass would be hanging out in the kitchen the day before to do it's Peking duck thing. So when I came home on Wednesday and Joe told me not to freak out about what was in the kitchen, I didn't think anything of it and expected for the duck carcass to be out on the counter. And it was. The duck was laying on the counter. With our giant fan placed in front of it. If the duck had hair, its hair would be flying in the breeze. I asked Joe why exactly was the duck placed strategically in a wind tunnel? and he told me that Peking ducks are supposed to be 'hung upside down in a windy area'. And because our landlord may not appreciate us dangling a duck carcass out the window on a string, a fan seemed like the best option. Sure.

Roasted garlic. Calorie free, obviously. For the:

... mashed potatoes!

I thought about making the pumpkin pie the night before but then I took some Xanax and went to sleep instead. Such is life. I discovered a pumpkin pie recipe that featured a shortbread crust while I was perusing the Martha Stewart website and I decided to go with that. I hate making pie crust and I don't particularly like it so this seemed perfect.

Brussel sprouts: pre-roast
And post-roast. Yum.

This pie was kind of ridiculously easy but I'm not complaining. The hardest part I had was figuring out when to take it out, since I haven't made many pumpkin pies and the filling is supposed to be jiggly when you take them out. But not too jiggly. And of course not jiggle-less. A gray area of jiggly. And I am not a Jiggle Master. A Jiggle Pro. Head Mistress of Jiggle. I am a Jiggle Apprentice and after checking the pie a few times I took it out at what I decided was an appropriate level of jiggleosity.

Clearly any silly words should not be included in any recipe I make, I just cannot stop.

Cornbread, up close and personal.

I really liked the way it came out, the shortbread crust was super easy and paired well with the filling. The shortbread crust was crunchy and not too sweet and did I mention about nine million times easier than making pie crust? Win win. Joe says he prefers regular ol' pie crust which is fine as long as he's willing to pay the mental health bills.

I was out of the kitchen pretty quickly since making pumpkin pie consists of lots of waiting. In the mean time, Joe made everything else: mashed potatoes, cornbread, brussel sprouts and gravy. I wandered in and out of the kitchen now and then to watch Joe battle the duck. The dimple-y skin from where the feathers were plucked out freaked me out the most. Perhaps because while getting something from the fridge and coming face to face with the duck I realized that is what my legs look like in winter.


I thought everything turned out really well, Joe did a lovely job. He did almost lose it while trying to carve the duck into pieces that did not look like a bear had shredded it. Minor detail though, he doesn't disassemble poultry all year round. He is now convinced he must go through some sort of poultry boot camp and make one every day for a week. I am so looking forward to it.

Here's the two recipes we used, everything else was just hodge podged together.
- Easy Pumpkin Pie with Shortbread Crust
- Skillet Cornbread

Pumpkin Pie Remix

A common question asked during the holiday season is, "I just can't seem to gain enough weight during the holidays! What can I do to pack the lbs on?" Don't worry, friends. I have the answer. And the answer is: pumpkin cheesecake.

Pumpkin flavored desserts are all winners in my book, I'm all about the spicy pumpkin baked goods. In October I began to think about what new pumpkin creation I could make. Pumpkin muffins? Check. Pumpkin cookies? Check. Pumpkin pie? Check. The unfortunate pumpkin pie that completely lacked sugar? Check. Pumpkin cheesecake? Oh hello, lover.

Cheesecake was also a good option because although Joe is not usually a sweets person, he cannot resist anything cold, sweet and creamy. I'm not sure he is physically capable of removing himself from a milkshake. Joe is similarly enamored with cheesecake and since his birthday is on Halloween, it seemed like a good thing to make.



I decided to spruce up the cheesecake a bit by making a gingersnap crust instead of the normal graham cracker crust that's in most cheesecakes. Originally I was going to make my own gingersnaps to grind for the crust and then I realized I was a crazy person and bought a bag of cookies from Whole Foods instead.

Gingersnap Pumpkin Cheesecake

Ingredients:

• 1 bag gingersnap cookies (I used a 12 oz bag) -- you'll want around 2 cups of cookie crumbs
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 3 8-ounce packages cream cheese, softened
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 2 egg yolks
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1 14 ounce can pumpkin pulp
• 1 Tbsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 2 tsp ginger
• 1/2 tsp salt

Directions:

Preheat oven 375 degrees F. Grind the gingersnaps in a food processor until they reach a fine crumb. Add melted butter and mix until thoroughly incorporated. Press the crust mixture into the bottom and springform pan. Now, make the filling. In a mixer bowl combine cream cheese, sugar, cornstarch, and vanilla. Beat until fluffy. Add eggs and yolks all at once, beating on low speed just until combined. Add spices and mix until incorporated. Fold in the cream and the pumpkin pulp.Pour into the crust lined pan. Place in a shallow baking pan in oven and fill baking pan with hot water to reach about half way up the spring form pan. Bake for about 55 minutes or until the center appears nearly set when shaken. Turn heat off and leave cheesecake in the cooler oven for 30 mins. Cool out of oven for an additional 30 minutes. Chill for 4 hours before serving.
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I thought this came out really well and it even won me a little fall baking contest. Loved the gingersnap crust though the butter in the crust could be decreased a bit. Sacrilege, I know. Joe plowed through most of it in no time by using hunks of cheesecake essentially as a meal replacement. If only such a diet existed. The all cheesecake diet? Count me in.



So this would be a nice twist on your Thanksgiving pumpkin pie. It would also make a good addition to your thighs. Or we can pretend its healthy because it is full of such nutritious things like vegetables (pumpkin), dairy (um, heavy cream and cream cheese) and protein (eggs). A well rounded meal!

Joe and I are having a small Thanksgiving of just the two of us so we'll just have a little feast of fall veggies, mashed potatoes and meat/meat-like products. I think Joe is going to attempt to roast a duck and I'm having my petite faux turkey roast. I've been vegetarian for nearly six years and one of the only times I encounter problems are at large Thanksgiving dinners where inevitably someone offers me turkey and I decline, telling them I'm a vegetarian. To which they say, "Oh, okay. I'll just give you a small piece then." What? I'm a vegetarian, not a oh-as-long-as-its-a-small-piece-tarian.

It does remind me of another fond memory of my German exchange trip. Before leaving, all the students wrote letters to our future host families in our broken toddler-level German and I threw in 'Ich bin Vegetarisch!' as a heads up. We arrived in Germany after traveling nine million hours on an airplane, which was somewhat like attending a flying drunken German party. Sleep deprived and smelling of stale German cigarettes, we were touted to a welcoming barbecue. I met my dear German host parents who immediately wanted to feed me and offered me a variety of meats. I explained to them I was vegetarian and the following conversation ensued, "Ah yes, I see, I see... But you eat chickens, yes? No? Of course, of course... But surely you eat sausage. Bratwurst, ja? Nein? Of course not. What about...." and I eventually told them I would eat fish, which seemed to calm them a bit. I don't normally eat fish or seafood at all but I was jet lagged and wanted to placate my host parents. Of course the local newspaper took picture of the BBQ and I appeared on the front page of the news, appearing slightly ill and holding a large platter of steaming meat products that I was bullied into holding. That's one down side of being 5'0: you're always stuck dead center in photographs, displaying something weird if needed. Like a tray of bratwurst while surrounded by smiling Germans.

Another time I saw a German restaurant had a vegetarian sandwich option so I tried to order it. And the German workers were like WHAT! SURELY YOU ARE MISTAKEN AND WANT IT WAS MEAT, JA?? NO MEAT? CAN... NOT... COMPUTE. BRAIN... EXPLODING.

I'm not sure how my German impression turned into a version of Terminator. Let's just go with it.

I'm sure I'll post something from Thanksgiving later this week, I'm just planning on doing a pumpkin pie. I may not survive though, every time I try to make pie crust I almost murder somebody. But I'm determined to conquer pie crust so I keep making it and come close to having a stroke each time. Every time I attempt it Joe is like, "Can I help you with anything, baby?" and I'm like, "WHY ARE YOU IN HERE?? GET OUT!! EVERYTHING IS FINE!! NO, I AM NOT - sob - CRYING!!"

I'm sure it will be a calm and relaxing Thanksgiving. Enjoy your holiday.

Muffin Party Memories

So I've continued my muffin obsession with several new batches of different muffins. The most recent ones are by far my favorite because they have the elusive ability to be moist, delicious and healthy. Pinch me!



I think I've mentioned that I'm also somewhat addicted to apples. I eat one just about every day. And for the record: an apple a day DOES NOT keep the doctor away, as I keep getting sick. Is someone poisoning my apples? Quit it. Anyway, apples are not my most favorite fruit but they are pretty reliableon the delicious scale. My very favorite, pears, hate me and go from rock hard to rotting when I turn my head. Oranges are a close second and besides the fact that they make my tummy die with their acidity, picking oranges is kind of dicey and a dry orange is the worst thing ever. Apples are pretty much delicious all the time. And since going without fruit is not an option for me, apples are usually around.

Recently Joe and I bought our standard big batch of local apples that would last me about 30 minutes or possibly week if I had self control. Unfortunately this was a rare batch of bad apples. Occasionally local apples can be a bit mealy and these guys had no delicious apple friends to forgive the presence of their mealy neighbors. So I decided to make apple muffins to put the apples out of their misery. Or out of my misery. That does not make sense but let us pretend it does, shall we?

And have I mentioned I LOVE THESE like a loving bear, as Joe and I would say in our horribly cheesy love language. Joe and I should really should be socialized like puppies because we don't function well outside of the safety of our apartment. I remember one time we were at the BMW dealership waiting for Joe's car to be fixed and I was holding a bunch of stuff and dropped one of them. Instead of responding like a normal human being, I pointed at it and squeaked, "Aaaaaiiiiee!" at Joe until he picked it up for me. I really did not think this was abnormal until Joe told me I can't do that sort of thing in public. Oh.

Healthy Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 2 heaping tablespoons apple sauce
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup milk
• 2 apples - peeled, cored and chopped

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Grease six muffin cups or line with paper muffin liners.
2. Stir together flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and cinnamon. In a separate bowl mix together egg, oil, applesauce and vanilla. All apples to dry ingredients and mix until apples are coated. Add wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix just until incorporated. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups, filling to the top of the cup.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.

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Easy peasy and delicious... smishious?

In other news I've recently begun pulling my old journal entries off the web and into a word document. I kept online journals throughout middle school and high school and I've been meaning to get a hard copy of my entries to have around in future. My middle school entries are just tragic and do not deserve to see the light of day but there are some good parts and tons of memories that I would have otherwise forgotten. The Muffin Story I thought was suitable for this entry.



Background: In high school I went on a student exchange trip to Germany and hilarity ensued. Here is one journal entry from the trip:

"On our last day in Korchenbroich, all the German students and American exchange students had a muffin baking party. I have no idea why, perhaps it's some strange parting tradition in Germany. Anyways, it was good times. The German students had to write down ten actions in English they didn't already know, like "to whisk" or "to pour". Andrew and Alex convinced some Germans that one action was "to secretly taste". They also convinced a few others that along with preheating overs, there was also "post heating and the recovery phase".

Then Andrew forgot the word "batter" and was really troubled by the notion of "muffin dough". "This isn't muffin DOUGH... this is muffin... okay, what the hell is it?"

Finally, hot Michael was practicing his English and when he bit into a muffin, he yelled, "This is SENSATIONAL!" and I laughed and said, "Dude, nobody actually says 'sensational' in the US. Unless you're a interior decorator or something."

How could I not save these heartwarming memories?

Birthday Blogging and Family Stories

It's birthday blog time! Happy birthday, mom!

My present will be late so here's a sneak preview of part of your gift and a blog entry to tide you over.

First off: the baked goods. I love fall flavored baked goods a lot. As in cinnamon and spice flavored, not leaf flavored. When trying to decide what to send my mom, I decided to bake some ginger spice cookies. I didn't have the required amount of ginger so I added some more spices to make up for it. See how clever I am? I just add 'spice' to the name to disguise the fact that I can't plan ahead.


They were yummy though and the first ginger cookie I've made that has the proper ginger cookie crackles on top. Which I failed to capture in my photos. Fail.

So expect a package of these guys in the mail soon, mama. Along with some other surprises that I hope you'll like as well.

And now. I think its only appropriate to share family stories on my mom's birthday. Which is unfortunate to the pride of the rest of my family. But it must be done.

When my older sister Mia was born, apparently she won Most Perfect Baby in the Universe award (typical older sister move) and my parents thought, "Geez, babies are great. Let's have some more!" And then with my birth things went terribly wrong and when that was over and done with my personality was somewhat akin to, "Woman who birthed me, what is this terrible place? You will be punished for bringing me to this cruel world. And who is that bearded man? I don't like the looks of him. And also: wah."

The next few years I clung to my mom like a spider monkey and had an emotional breakdown each time she tried to pry me off to indulge in such selfish things as feeding herself. There are few pictures of me as baby and in the ones that exist I am on verge of tears, reaching out to the camera because my mom had dared to be six inches away from me. I was the infant Queen and mother was my servant. My dad likes to tell a story in which Mia and I were going out to go somewhere and the family was in a hurry so my dad tied my shoes. I burst into tears because MOM DIDN'T DO IT.

I eventually became somewhat more emotionally stable. I think. At least I don't have a panic attack when my mom doesn't tie my shoes. But this may only because I now only wear slip on shoes. I also warmed up to The Goofy Bearded One, aka my father.

Since the holidays are approaching, I thought I would also describe the infamous Blankensop sister Christmas video, which scarily portrays the differences between me and my sister. Since Mia is extroversion personified and I am the emotionally repressed introvert, watching any old home video of us interacting is bound to be hilarious.To give you an idea of the differences between my sister and I, here's a scene from a random family video: Toddler Sophie is curled up in a rocking chair, quietly flipping through a picture book. My mom is filming me and I'm bashfully answering her questions. Mia enters the room, looks at my mom filming me. She then storms up to the rocking chair, shoves me out of the chair and says to the camera, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING, MOMMY? HEY, LOOK AT THIS BOOK!! DO YOU WANT ME TO TALK ABOUT THIS BOOK?!"

The Christmas video is a similar experience. Cue video from the early 90's. Mia and I are sitting in the kitchen on Christmas morning. She's maybe eight and I'm about four. I am on the left, smiling shyly at the camera with my giant brown Romanian Orphan eyes. Mia is on the right, sitting on the edge of her seat and appears to have just consumed copious amounts of cocaine. Throughout the entire video she is grinning like a mad loon, talking nonstop and gesturing violently. I'm surprised her hands didn't 'accidentally' go out of control and hit me in the face.

It is also imperative to know that Mia had a speech impediment when she was younger. She sounded like a tiny pixie-like version like Elmer Fudd throughout most of elementary school. She could not manage R's so, like her cartoon cousin, rabbit became wabbit, rascally became wascally etc. With speech therapy she eventually was able to overcome this but it was a particularly hilarious era in Mia's life. Or should I say... hiwawious? In the video I also can't pronounce R's because I'm a baby, cut me a break.

The entire video goes something like this:
Mom: So girls, are you excited for Christmas?
Mia: I LOVE CHWISTMAS BECAUSE SANTA COMES AND BRINGS PWESENTS AND SANTA ATE THE COOKIES AND MILK LAST NIGHT AND I LOVE CWRISTMAS BECAUSE IT IS NICE, WIGHT SOPHIE?!
Me: Wight.
Mom: Sophie, what's that present behind you?
Me: It's-
Mia: IT'S A BEAWR (note: 'bear') AND IT IS A PINK BEAWR AND SHE CALLS IT PINKY. SANTA LEFT IT FOR HER AND I GOT LOTS OF OTHER PWESENTS TOO, WIGHT SOPHIE?!
Me: Wight.

This continues for about ten more minutes. I'm pretty sure the only time I say something other than 'wight' is when Mia attempts to snatch my blankie out of my hands and I say, "Don't touch my bwankie, it's vewy special..." Meanwhile, Mia continues to talk at light speed and at one point spontaneously bursts into song. Luckily she now does improv so she has an outlet for her crazy. The crazy still seeps through some but it is mostly contained.

And yet Mia still insists that I am the weird one because I may or may not have had an onion peel collection as a child. For the record, this is also a lie.

Aren't you proud of your children? What's that you say? What about Piers? What little brother? Just kidding, I have hilarious stories about my brother Piers as well. All in good time, all in good time.

Happy birthday again!

Rye crackers!

So blah blah I've been really busy and blah blah blah haven't baked blah blah I suck etc.

But it's true! I've had classes from 9-5 for two weeks (I'd like to thank sudoku and electronic scrabble from keeping me from killing myself) and when I wasn't in class I was either doing homework, napping or watching trashy reality television. Very important things, obviously. But things have settled down a lot recently and I finally had time to ask Joe what he would like me to bake. And he had very specific ideas: Crackers. Rye crackers.



Rye crackers? Sure. Google is my friend and I found a recipe pretty quickly. Seriously, what did people do before the internet? I already don't remember my life before my iPhone, a dark age in which I couldn't access celebrity gossip at every moment of every day. How did I live?

Rye Crackers

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup (3 3/4 ounces) whole rye (pumpernickel) flour
• 1 cup (4 1/4 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick, 2 ounces) butter
• 3 tablespoons (7/8 ounce) caraway seeds
• 1/2 cup (4 ounces) water
• 1 tablespoon molasses
• Additional salt for sprinkling (optional)

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 325°F. Lightly grease baking sheets or line with parchment paper.

TO MAKE THE DOUGH: Combine the flours, cocoa and salt in a large bowl. Cut in the butter until the mixture is crumbly, using your fingers, a pastry blender or fork or a mixer. Add the caraway seeds and toss to mix.

Combine the water and molasses in a measuring cup and stir to mix. Gradually add the liquid to the dry ingredients, mixing till you can gather the dough into a cohesive ball.

TO SHAPE AND BAKE THE CRACKERS: Divide the dough into 3 pieces; roll it out, one piece at a time, till it's 1/16, inch thick, being sure to flour underneath when necessary so the dough doesn't stick to the work surface.

Use a baker's bench knife, a sharp knife, a pizza wheel or a square cookie cutter to cut the dough into 2-inch squares. Transfer the squares to prepared baking sheets.

Bake the crackers until they begin to brown and smell toasty, 18 to 23 minutes. Remove the crackers from the oven, transfer to a rack and cool completely before serving. Store in airtight containers.
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If you like rye and caraway then you'll like these. The only issue I had with them was that since the dough was pretty dark, it was hard to tell when they were done and I ended up under baking a bunch of them. In my oven, these needed at least 25 minutes.

I would tell you that I'll have another post up soon about the apple crisp I made the other day but Joe ate all of it before I could take a picture of it. However, Brian came over for dinner and I am currently quietly moving the bowl of tiramisu I made today closer and closer to his chair in hopes he'll eat thirds. He lost 13 lbs since he moved out, I can't imagine why.

In other news, let's talk about what else has been consuming my life and that is BABIES. I've always known vaguely that I wanted to have kids some day but that changed last year I was doing my pediatric rotation. It confirmed my desire to have kids someday until one day I took care of an infant whose parents were at a class learning how to take care of one of his medical devices. So I was with him a lot to give him his feedings. And while I was coaxing him to finish one of his bottles, his big blue eyes looked into mine and a small bomb went off in my uterus and said, "OH HELLO. LET ME INTRODUCE MYSELF. MY NAME IS BIOLOGICAL CLOCK, MAY I SUGGEST YOU HAVE BABIES IMMEDIATELY?" and I was all, "Shut up, ovaries, I cannot have babies anytime soon!" Hormones reply with, "No problem, maybe you can just take this little guy home? I'm sure nobody will notice."

Obviously I didn't steal the baby but now whenever I saw children my ovaries go, "HELLO WE CAN'T HELP BUT NOTICE YOU ARE NOT YET PREGNANT. PLEASE REMEDY THIS SITUATION ASAP."

It's very distracting, I wasn't aware that you turn 21 and then have sudden urges to have litters of babies. Joe tolerates it now but I'm sure he'll get weary of it when he finds the darling bassinet I bought.

Just kidding.

July's Daring Baking Challenge + I'm Back!

So I’m WAY late for this Daring Bakers Challenge but I have all sorts of good excuses. I was planning on making these towards the end of July and had all of the supplies ready. And then I got the killer flu from hell.

I haven’t had the flu in years and this one hit me like a ton of bricks. I almost said a ton of steel bricks but those don’t exist, do they? I obviously have suffered from permanent brain damage from my fever. I was basically incapacitated for a week, slumped in one of Joe’s armchairs, possibly drooling a tad. I spent most of my time watching awful television because shows like Bridezillas require no brain activity and with my 102 degree fever, I couldn’t spare any strength. I know y’all are just waiting for your own excuse to watch such glorious monstrosities without judgment.

I finished the challenge when I was done dying but by that time I was already late to post. Then I had to move back to school. Then I had to move in to a new apartment that didn’t have internet yet. I almost died of withdrawal but my sanity was saved by my iPhone.
So at this point are you like, “JESUS WOMAN, JUST TELL US WHAT YOU MADE”? Because I’m sort of sick of myself at this point. So here’s the blurb-o-the-month:The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

We had the option of making milanos, the marshmallow cookies or both. I had originally planned on making both but since I ran out of time, I decided on the milanos only. I’ve made marshmallows before so I didn’t feel a burning urge to make them again.



Recipe:

Milan Cookies

Recipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network website

INGREDIENTS:

12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

• 12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 1/2 cups (312.5 grams/ 11.02 oz) powdered sugar
• 7/8 cup egg whites (from about 6 eggs)
• 2 tablespoons vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons lemon extract
• 1 1/2 cups (187.5grams/ 6.61 oz) all purpose flour
• Cookie filling, recipe follows

Cookie filling:
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 orange, zested

DIRECTIONS:

1. In a mixer with paddle attachment cream the butter and the sugar.
2. Add the egg whites gradually and then mix in the vanilla and lemon extracts.
3. Add the flour and mix until just well mixed.
4. With a small (1/4-inch) plain tip, pipe 1-inch sections of batter onto a parchment-lined sheet pan, spacing them 2 inches apart as they spread.
5. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10 minutes or until light golden brown around the edges. Let cool on the pan.
6. While waiting for the cookies to cool, in a small saucepan over medium flame, scald cream.
7. Pour hot cream over chocolate in a bowl, whisk to melt chocolate, add zest and blend well.
8. Set aside to cool (the mixture will thicken as it cools).
9. Spread a thin amount of the filling onto the flat side of a cookie while the filling is still soft and press the flat side of a second cookie on top.
10. Repeat with the remainder of the cookies.

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These were easier to make than I had thought: I was mostly worried about the cookie dough. To shape the cookies, you have to pipe the dough (batter?) onto the cookie sheet. I don’t have much piping experience and my piping set was back at school. Snipping the tip off a ziplock bag ended up working just fine though.



I liked these alright, they looked a lot like milanos and tasted good to boot. The only issue I had with them is that the texture of the cookies was different from the Pepperidge Farm milanos, which have two crunchy cookies sandwiched between a dark chocolate ganache filling. This recipe yielded much softer cookies, more like a crisper madeleine. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing but not exactly Milano-like. My teenage brother ate most of them, which is always a plus.
So now I’m back in Cleveland, braving the ungodly heat wave and thunderstorms. School started and when I stop dying of heat stroke I’ll start baking again.

Brian has graduated and moved on from living with Joe and I but we’ll still see him around. We spent the past weekend with Brian and his childhood friend, Sam, at Sam’s cottage. I met Sam’s pugs for the first time, one of which is the saddest example of a dog I’ve ever seen. The thing must be approximately 200 years old in dog years because she can barely walk from arthritis, can barely see from cataracts and can barely breath from… being an ancient pug. The poor thing sounds like a broken lawnmower, she is constantly like GRUNTGRUNTGRUNT-WHEEZE-GRUNTYGRUNTGRUNT-WHEEEEEEZE. I eventually decided that she was trying to navigate through echolocation.

The cottage is on Lake Eerie, which apparently is a giant tourist destination because there is a giant touristy boardwalk full of weird stores, arcades and bars. At one arcade I won a stuffed triceratops. And by ‘won’ I mean the stoned teenager at the prize desk thought I was cute and gave me a 600-ticket prize for my 12 tickets. Being cute has its advantages, like collecting all the sweatshop made stuffed animals your heart could ever desire.

At one creepy store they sold a variety of things ranging from leather goods, plastic mythical creatures to illegal weapons. Which of course means that Brian bought a switchblade he promptly christened Knifey. I spent most of the rest of the weekend pleading with Brian not to play with Knifey, which of course didn’t stop him from dueling a rose bush late at night on Saturday after a few beers.

Sunday we all headed to a local medieval fair, which was fun in an awkward sort of way. Some of the people working at the medieval fair are genuinely SO INTO the experience that it makes us semi-sane vaguely uncomfortable. Also, it seems that many people are convinced that in medieval times, fairies and dragons lived aside people and ate such delicacies as deep-fried pickles and cheesecake on sticks. It was fun though, except for the part where it was nine million degrees outside.

Another fun challenge, milanos are something I probably wouldn’t have thought to make these cookies on my own. This month’s challenge will be even more difficult so check back to see how I fare!

Squirrel* cookies! *No squirrels were hurt in the production of these cookies. Sorry to disapoint you.

For my sister's birthday, just about my entire family bought my sister cooking and baking related supplies. Like me, my sister loves to bake and even runs a little cupcake business on the side. Among other things, my mom got Mia a cupcake cookbook, my dad got her a food processor and I got her some various cupcake liners, sprinkles, flavoring and cookie cutters from Bake it Pretty. I stumbled upon Bake it Pretty a couple days before Mia's birthday and just about hyperventilated because I wanted everything on the site. I knew Mia would too (love it, not hyperventilate) so I picked out a bunch of stuff for her.

Speaking of Mia's birthday, I totally screwed up this year and thought her birthday was two days earlier than it actually was. I blame part of this on the fact that Joe and I drove to DC that day so I had just spent all my brain cells on watching the road and feeding Joe fruit for eight hours. We got into DC late and right before we went to bed I was like, "SHIT TODAY WAS MIA'S BIRTHDAY, RIGHT?" and I called Mia and left a cheery message on her voicemail wishing her happy birthday.

It was not her birthday. But at least I was two days EARLY, right? At least that's what I tell myself.

Anyways, my mom wanted Mia and I to use some of her birthday goodies to bake together and blog about. I said sure before seeing Mia's kitchen, which is about the size of a large cardboard box. One person can barely fit in it, let alone two. So when I say 'we made these' I mean we took turns being in the kitchen.

Cupcakes are cute but Mia and I wanted to make something that I could home to mom and cupcakes do not travel well. Cookies travel well though and would give us a chance to use the cute cookie cutters I got Mia, which included a squirrel and a cupcake. We decided to make shortbread cookie sandwiches filled with fig jam, since my mom loves fig jam and I like the shortbread recipe from the cookie book.

Here's the squirrel. Isn't he cute? Apparently I didn't take any pictures of the cupcake cookies because I took these pictures literally on my way out of Mia's apartment on the way to the airport. Joe and I had called a cab for three o'clock and when he didn't show at three, Joe called him to ask where our cab was. The basic answer was the hell if he knew, there were no cabs in the area. So we were like GREAT, THANKS and walked to subway instead. With 50 lb bags. I cried a little and nearly stabbed Joe's eyes out because he was nearest to me. Then I took some xanax and things were a lot better.

And thus concludes things I baked and took pictures of in California.

These were good, I think? I can't really remember but considering I like that shortbread recipe and the fig jam, I think it's safe to say these were good. Recipe previously shown here.

I've made a few things in Alaska (including this month's Daring Baker challenge, in which I became a BAKING GODDESS OF AWESOMENESS) but you'll just have to wait for those.

Technicolor Unicorn Poops: Rainbow Cupcakes

Last Wednesday was my last day on my pediatric rotation so our group decided to make baked goods for the staff to thank them for putting up with us. Rainbows are theme of the pediatric hospital so I was suddenly inspired to make rainbow cupcakes.



Rainbow cupcakes were all over the food blogging scene for awhile and though I thought they were cute, I never had the occasion to make them. If you've never seen them before, you basically make white or yellow cake batter and then divide the batter into six bowls and dye each section a different color of the rainbow. Then you layer the colors in cupcake liners and bake. Ta da! Rainbow cupcakes.

I don't have a go to white cake recipe so I just used a Martha Stewart recipe that another blogger used for her cupcakes. I thought they turned out a little weird, they some how reminded me a bit of cornbread? Joe liked that they weren't too sweet though and they were better with frosting. Of course I can't find the recipe now to share with you but I'm not too sad unless you're dying to have a cornbread style white cake. If you'd like to make rainbow cupcakes yourself, I recommend this website.

For the frosting, I just used left over cream cheese frosting I had left over from the monster carrot cake. Brian ate one of the leftover tubs with a box of crackers but luckily one tub was still left over and was more than enough to frost all the cupcakes. I also dyed the frosting to top the cupcakes and did of a few in each color.



Brian thought these cupcakes were hilarious and dubbed them unicorn poops, which didn't stop him from eating the leftover ugly ones that I didn't take to the hospital. Other women will probably think you're really cute and creative when you make these and boys will think you are clinically insane. Such is life.

I've read a lot of criticisms of rainbow cake because it has- GASP SHOCK HORROR- FOOD COLORING in it. I think the food coloring here is the least of your worries, you should probably more concerned about how many sticks of butter are in this, not the two drops of blue food coloring you added. Cupcakes are never health food, people. Have people never heard of red velvet cake, which uses an ENTIRE BOTTLE of red food coloring? Chill out, people.

In any case, these are cute cute cute little suckers and pretty tasty to boot. Also they required my monthly cupcake requirement for the blog. I think these would be adorable for a kids birthday party, baby shower or gay pride event. They cover a lot of bases, really.



Next up: Daring Bakers challenge! And I am SO excited about this one, I plan on eating it tonight. Nyum nyum nyum.

Tapioca Pudding: When You Want Frogs Eyes in Your Pudding

So whenever I ask the boys what I should bake next, Joe always suggests something weird and elaborate and BJ inevitably asks for pudding, specifically pistachio or tapioca. I've never had pistachio pudding in my life, it's usually a frightening shade of neon green that I don't trust. I do like tapioca pudding but then the question was raised: just exactly where do you buy tapioca pearls?

The last time I was grocery shopping, I was perusing the baking aisle and stumbled upon a bag of tapioca pearls, just like that. I was expected I would have to look for them at a speciality store or Whole Foods or something but no, this was just in some random grocery store next to instant Jell-O pudding.

So I did some research and whipped some up last weekend when bored. I'm glad I read about it because it turns out you first have to soak the tapioca pearls and then cook them in the pudding to make them edible. The package said to soak them overnight but I soaked them for about an hour with no problems. Delayed gratification is not my strong point.

I was really happy with how this turned out, considering I've never played with tapioca before. I did use non-dairy milk and homemade vanilla extract and I think it would be loads better with vanilla bean or regular vanilla extract. You see, our 'homemade' vanilla is rum soaked with a vanilla bean but it really just tastes overwhelmingly like rum. Especially since Joe has been refilling it with Bacardi 151, which I think may not actually be alcohol but paint thinner. Usually it works okay in baked goods but in something where the vanilla flavor is so pronounced, this didn't cut it. It ended up being more of a rum flavored pudding than a vanilla pudding. And the non-dairy milk worked fine but Joe thought it could be more creamy. 

In any case, BJ and I ate it all fairly quickly and I would make it again. I probably will have to, what else do you do with a bag of tapioca pearls?

Recipe can be found here. I followed pretty much to a T, except I added 1/2 cup tapioca pearls instead 1/3 cup (when in Rome...) and use So Delicious brand coconut milk instead of milk. 

Busy baking week this week! I promised to make goodies for people on Wednesday and I have to finish the month's Daring Baker challenge by next Sunday. Plus I should really start studying for finals, which means baking procrastination starts to look really attractive.

Easter disaster cake

I had a lot of trouble deciding what dessert to bring to Easter dinner. On Saturday I still hadn't decided and I went to the local market to see if anything looked particularly inspiring. I wasn't inspired (though I did pick up some supplies for the next Daring Bakers challenge, which will be DELICIOUS) so I just went to my fall back plan: carrot cake. I've made carrot cake before. It's good, easy, and carrots = rabbits = spring = Easter. Or something.

And then things started to go horribly wrong. I didn't get the required vegetable oil until 10 pm so I had a late start. I looked at the recipe, one I had never used before, and thought it looked weird but decided to go with it. The recipe calls to mix the shredded carrots in with the dry ingredients, and then add the wet ingredient just until mix in. Okay, fine. But my batter appeared very thin and I had way more than would fill one cake pan. And while pouring it into the pans, I realized that the carrot/flour mixture had clumped, leaving delightful carrot/flour clumps throughout the batter. Excellent. I tried to smoosh them out but it still looked suspect. But it was nearing midnight and I was panicked so I put them into the oven.



These baked SO strangely, they were like the pod people of the cake world. They baked, but had a strangle bubbly layer on top that refused to much except for becoming weirdly gelatinous. I had no idea when to take this out because while my sticks were coming out clean, the very top remained slightly underbaked. Which doesn't make any sense, what cake bakes from the bottom up without ever solidifying completely on top? But after the cake had been in the oven much longer than called for, I pulled it out.

I ended up with about one and a half cakes: a full cake pan and a spring form pan that was like 1/2 inch thick since I didn't want to throw out the rest of the batter. I let them cool and unmolded them. Baby cake unmolded okay. Big cake was stubborn coming out of the pan. Eventually half came out while half stayed stubbornly in my generously greased pan. I was horrified. And tired, seeing as though it was now close to 1 am. I freaked out for awhile and eventually scraped the rest of the cake out the pan, kind of puzzle piecing the bits together. Than I topped the deformed mess with the baby cake, so it now bared some sort of resemblance to a cake and not the hideous beast I had created.



I used the orange-ginger cream cheese frosting that I made for my carrot cake cupcakes (which turned out lovely, of course) and it turned out fine, which is probably why I didn't have a nervous breakdown. I smothered the monster cake with frosting and than haphazardly decorated it with pastel sprinkles and Easter colored M&Ms. And then I fretted to Joe about how much my carrot cake sucked and he reassured me until I felt okay about it.

The next day I had the traditional Easter of church, Easter lunch and then played a festive game of Life. I should've took pictures of lunch because it was all very delicious and fattening: veggie pot pie for the vegetarians, ham for the omnis and cheesy potatoes and spinach squares for everybody. The carrot cake tasted fine-- I think cream cheese frosting fixes everything-- so I was satisfied with it, though I'll shun the recipe for the rest of my days. I have no idea what I did wrong or if it was the recipe, the recipe did have good reviews but I followed the directions exactly and measured all the ingredients on a scale so I have no idea what happened. I blame you, Alton Brown!

Anyways. Now I have tons of left over cream cheese frosting left over that I'm not sure what to do with, any ideas? Brian has been eating it in the middle of the night with a spoon but there's still plenty left. No Easter M&Ms were spared though, Brian swiftly ate them all. And almost died in the process. He threw one up in the air to catch in his mouth but it landed in his throat instead and he immediately doubled over and started hacking. Joe and I were totally prepared to do the Heimlich maneuver. If we had managed to stop laughing. He was fine though, he just ended up swallowing a whole M&M. Which is good, because Brian would've been really pissed off if a pastel colored M&M caused his death and not something more bad ass, such as a brain hemorrhage while playing Call of Duty 4.

Obviously I'm not going to post the recipe I used, but if you're morbidly curious, here it is. I did like the rest of Easter dessert ideas people threw out there and I plan to make them eventually. Next up: tapioca pudding.

Uggo oatmeal cookies

I have another cold. What happened to my immune system of steel? I think it's probably because the last two years I've been working in the hospital with adults and the last few months I've been working with kiddos instead. New germies. Delightful! Not to mention that Brian is constantly wary of any hospital germs I could be carrying. He asks me all sorts of medical questions but the minute I clear my throat or sneeze, he stares daggers at me and won't be within 5 feet of me. Which is probably smart since Joe cannot escape me and inevitably ends up with whatever I have, bwa haha.

Anyways. I made cookies recently. I got a bit cookied out for a few months, probably from the Great Christmas Cookie Extravaganza, Part 1 and Part 2. Joe suggested I make chocolate chip cookies recently when I couldn't decide what to make and I broke out of my cookie slump. I used the chocolate chip cookie recipe from The Sweet Life, my favorite dessert book. I had never tried this recipe before and they were WONDERFUL. So much so that I didn't even get a chance to take a picture of them.

The recipe was kind of that mythical chocolate chip cookie recipe that is crisp and caramelized on the edges with a chewy, soft center. It yielded something like four dozen cookies but since the proportions of the recipe would've been weird if I halved it (half an egg, anybody?) Joe told me to make the whole thing, telling me I could bring some to work tomorrow. I ended up not bringing any to work, however, because I remembered that one of my co-workers can't have gluten. But they were still all eaten within 24 hours. I ate two cookies. That means that Joe and BJ both ate about two dozen cookies within a day. I hate boys.



So a few days later I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from the same cookbook. It's actually pretty remarkable that I had chocolate chips left over, Brian has the tendency to wake up from hungover hibernations and immediately consume large amounts of candy, sometimes a pound of chocolate chips. This time though I think he ate two dozen cookies instead so I was in the clear.

The oatmeal cookies were really good but man, they are ugly. They were really thin but lumpy because of the oats. On my first batch my oven was a bit too hot and the cookies were paper thin and on the edge of burnt. I took them out of the oven with a look like, "What the eff cookies! You do not look so delicious!" But they got a bit prettier after I sorted out the oven temperature. It helps that we FINALLY got an oven thermometer, where we learned that our oven runs about 50 degrees hotter than it says. No wonder I was having to pull my baked goods early.

I dubbed these Uggo cookies, after the sphynx cat Brian decided he should get solely to name Uggo. Sphynx cats are those delightful hairless kitties. Like this:
I especially like that one because he's a bit cross eyed. Poor guy. In case you were wondering, the only TV show BJ and I can agree upon is Cats 101 and Dogs 101. The other 99% of the time, I'm mocking the horrible dialogue on Burn Notice and he's making fun of the multiple horrible reality TV shows I so adore.

I can't find the recipe online so I won't post it, sorry! I'm a little terrified of copy infringement. I'll try to find the chocolate chip cookie recipe or just suck it up and post it because you deserve to make them, they are DELICIOUS.

p.s I am spending Passover with Joe and Easter with Katie, my bestie. My gentile, non-Kosher hands are not allowed to make anything for Passover but Katie suggested I bring dessert to Easterfest. What should I make? So far I have thought of: carrot cake, some sort of cheesecake or pie. Let the voting commence.

A Warning

I must take a time out from baking and leave the interweb with a very important warning.

My chinchilla is clearly planning world domination. Prepare yourselves.

Joe and Sophie make croissants and then gain 9 lbs

For our five year anniversary, I arranged for Joe and I to take a cooking class at a local culinary school making croissants. I thought it would be a good way to maximize our butter intake. I mean... love intake?

No recipe because um, these take three days (or one really crappy day) to make and I'm not up to typing all that up. This looks pretty similar to the recipe and method we used though.


Here's the dough we started with. Obviously we couldn't make it all from scratch, this wasn't croissant making summer camp. Our teacher showed us how to make croissants from scratch using dough in various stages and provided us with dough to work with. So we started with dough in the final stages: this is what you would have on the third day. Look at all those layers already! You get those from doing three "3-folds" on the prior days.


At this stage we could roll out our dough, letting it relax for a bit between rollings. This is my sheet. I assure you it was the best in the class.

Actually, the teacher did compliment my very impressive dough rectangle and I was proud, though I saw him compliment some severely ugly rolls later that day. But I'll take what I can get.


Next we cut our rectangles into thirds: the bottom 2 thirds were cut smaller than the upper 1/3. We used the small sections to fill and roll up and the big section to form traditional crescent croissants.
Here are my cheese rolls. They were supposed to have ham and cheese but I don't eat meat so cheese it was. These ones were just rolled up from the bottom, pretty easy peasy.


Here are some of my finished rolls. Some of these are filled with cheese and the rest are filled with chocolate chips. A few of my chocolate chips didn't make it into the croissants because they mysteriously migrated into my mouth.


This is our baking sheet filled with our respective rolls, Joe's are the ones filled with ham and mine are the pretty ones, obviously.

I'm kidding. Joe's were very pretty too.

Hey, did you know that rolling crescents that are pretty is HARD? Here are some of mine in various stages of hideousness.

But it didn't matter how ugly they were because they were baked and all hideousness was canceled out by sweet, buttery innards. Here are some of the regular rolls, baked. Mmm. Is there cheese or chocolate inside? IT'S A DELIGHTFUL SURPRISE.

This one is chocolate filled. Sweet, sweet chocolate.


Look at that flaky, buttery goodness. This one is ham and cheese. Obviously.

I've never been a huge fan of croissants but I'd only ever had the ones from grocery stores. And really, anything is delicious when it contains six sticks of butter and is fresh out of the oven. These ones were amazing and I ate about five that morning. And then my stomach exploded. Luckily the healing properties of butter are amazing.

The class was really fun and we got to take home about nine million croissants. Definitely worth the money, although my hips may disagree.

Espresso Shortbread for the Week of Doom

I don't even know what to say about this week except that forks were looking like mighty fine objects to slowly advance into my skull. I took these pictures last Sunday but The Week of Doom prevented me from posting until today.

On Sunday I finished a giant 20 page project and decided to celebrate and bake. Except that nobody bothered to tell me that the due date of the project was changed while I was out of the room and wouldn't be due for another week. Fork to brain incident #1. Anyways, I eventually decided on making a chocolate-dipped espresso shortbread recipe from my cookie magazine that I'm baking my way through.



This (and the other shortbread recipe from the magazine) is one of the better recipes I've tried, I'm a big fan of shortbread. I thought the coffee flavor of these guys could be stronger but I still liked them a lot. Next time I wouldn't roll them as thin but I've only made shortbread once before and I don't really know what I'm doing. It could've been a lot worse, like the time I made pumpkin pie and forgot to add sugar. DELICIOUS.

Chocolate-Dipped Espresso Shortbread, from Fine Cooking
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INGREDIENTS:

8 oz. (1 cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tsp. table salt
10 oz. (2-1/4 cups) all-purpose flour
2 Tbs. finely ground espresso coffee beans

For the dipping chocolate
9 oz. semisweet chocolate, chopped
1 Tbs. vegetable shortening:

Line two baking sheets with parchment. Combine the butter, sugar, and salt in a stand mixer bowl (use the paddle attachment) or a large mixing bowl. Mix on low speed until the butter combines with the sugar but isn't perfectly smooth, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the flour and ground espresso and mix on low speed, scraping the bowl frequently, until the dough has just about pulled together, about 3 minutes; don't overmix.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough to about 1/4 inch thick. Aim for a uniform thickness to ensure even baking. Using a heart or other shape cookie cutter, cut out shapes as close to one another as possible. Press the scraps together, roll them out, and cut out more cookies. If the dough becomes sticky, refrigerate it briefly. Arrange the cookies on two parchment-lined baking sheets and refrigerate until chilled, at least 20 minutes.

Position oven racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven and heat the oven to 300° F. Bake the cookies until golden on the bottom and edges and pale to golden on top, 30 minutes to 1 hour. (After 15 minutes, swap the position of the baking sheets and rotate them 180 degrees for even baking.) If the cookies are done before 30 minutes, reduce the oven temperature to 275° F for the remaining batches; if they take longer than 1 hour, increase the temperature to 325° F.

Dip the baked, cooled cookies:

Set a sheet of parchment or waxed paper on a work surface. Put the chocolate and shortening in a small heatproof bowl and set the bowl over a pan of simmering water. Melt the chocolate, stirring, until it's smooth and warm; don't let it get hot. Dip half of each cookie into the chocolate. Set the cookies on the parchment and let the chocolate set up at room temperature, about 2 hours.

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I don't get these baking instructions. Bake somewhere between 30 minutes and an hour? Uh, that's a big range, especially when a minute or two extra could ruin these. I ended up baking them about 25 minutes but I did make mine a bit thin. Also, I had to chill the dough some, it was reeeeeally soft and hard to work with. But other than that, it was a-okay. Oh: I melted the chocolate and shortening in the microwave. Worked fine.



I made these while wearing my robe, which is not at all surprising if you know me and my disdain for clothing, especially pants and socks. Brian happened to come in as I noticed that one of my sleeves was covered in flour. I mused out loud, "Hm, I should probably stop baking in my robe..." to which Brian said, "Um, yeah. About that. It is acceptable to wear a robe an hour before bed and up to an hour after waking up. Not, you know, NINETY PERCENT OF YOUR WAKING DAY." But this is coming from somebody who A) survived for a good year on white rice and ranch dressing to save money and B) once became so drunk that he forgot how to read. He cannot be trusted.

Joe has been making tons of bread lately. Joe decided it looked like fun after I made a few loaves of bread at the beginning of the year. And then he quickly became obsessed with it and I have been literally unable to make more bread because Joe is undoubtedly already making five different loaves that day. He's been hinting that I should post some of his bread on the blog, which I've been hesitant to do because I like to post recipes and Joe's recipes are 20 pages long from a scary looking bread encyclopedia. But here's one anyways, sans recipe: cheese bread!



I loved this bread, which is unsurprising since it combined simple carbs with cheese which made my bones turn to jelly. Then I had a feeding tube installed so that no time would be wasted in that time consuming chewing stuff. Luckily, it's gone now and I can stop gorging on it.

In other news, today is Joe's and my five year anniversary. I won't get too mushy, I'll just say that Joe's presence is probably the sole reason why the forks were not actually forcibly inserted into my brain this week. The Tiffany's ring he got me didn't hurt either. I love you.

Our anniversary gift from Brian was him cleaning the shower curtain. Which actually was a great gift, since we had a few mold colonies the size of several small continents growing on it. I was starting to fear for my life whenever I took a shower.

Stay tuned for February's Daring Bakers challenge!